Grafton Way

Ipswich

Retail foodstore, other retail, restaurant and cafe units, two hotels, leisure and 112 residential units in buildings up to eight storeys. Designed by Mountford Pigott.

Summary

We applaud the project team on their presentation and the clarity with which the concept of the scheme was explained to us. The design team presents a compelling case for a Tesco-led mixed use scheme on this underused site on the southern edge of the town centre. The success of this scheme will, in part, rely on how the site’s edges are addressed, and how effectively connections are made to the historic core and university quarter to the east. Subject to the local authority feeling able to support a Tesco superstore on this site, it should work closely with the applicants and highway authority to ensure links are improved for the wider benefit of the town. It will be critical to ensure that the scheme’s public realm is active, safe and appealing as a place to enjoy the riverside, and assist wider east/west pedestrian movement through the town. We would ask the design team to re-evaluate its approach to the architecture, in particular the suitability of nautical imagery in this context. Finally, whilst we welcome the inclusion of residential uses within the scheme, further testing of the environmental performance and quality of living accommodation may suggest a more optimal arrangement for this use. We strongly recommend that the comments made below are addressed before planning permission is granted.

Uses, public realm and connections

We acknowledge that this proposal has come forward in advance of the publication of the council’s retail impact study which will determine the suitability of this town centre site for a large format supermarket of the type proposed. Notwithstanding, we welcome the design team’s positive approach to the challenge of accommodating this use on a town centre site by incorporating it within a mixed use scheme. We think the accompanying uses, including residential, retail and hotel elements, could complement the Tesco well. This scheme should try to realise the potential benefits for Ipswich by enhancing the offer of the town centre, supplementing the established comparison retail and leisure provision within the core. This will rely, in part, on strengthening pedestrian connections to the historic core and university quarter and quayside to the east which will require a coordinated effort on the part of the local authority, county council and applicant to address the challenging pedestrian environment. In light of this, it would be prudent for the authorities to carry out a separate study of the road network around Cardinal Park, principally Quadling Street and Bridge Street, to identify a solution that resolves the current difficulties. The development could, in fact, form part of that solution, easing traffic congestion in the town centre by encouraging shoppers to park in the Tesco car park and walk into the town centre.

The local authority should assure itself that the public realm proposals facilitate movement through the site and the wider town centre and that any conflict is minimised between pedestrian and vehicular entrances into the site on Grafton Way. It was hard to grasp from the material presented the pedestrian experience of negotiating the changes of levels formed by the series of steps, ramps and edges across the site. There would appear to be a pinch point between the two hotel blocks where the users of both facilities will converge with pedestrians heading to the town centre. We also think there is an opportunity to create more celebratory public spaces in this development to ensure they feel like a part of the town centre rather than areas purely for servicing the hotels, cafés and shops across the site. Likewise, whilst we think the boardwalk could provide an effective link from the train station to the site along the riverside, its success will depend on achieving a sustained level of activity along this route. The provision of an entrance to Tesco from the boardwalk could be helpful in encouraging shoppers to visit the riverside cafés and restaurants here before or after their weekly shop.

Built form and architectural expression

The introduction of a large format superstore into a town centre location presents a particular challenge when addressing its edges and linking it with the scale of the town. In our view, buildings of the scale and footprint proposed could be successfully accommodated on this site. We support the principle of wrapping the Tesco store with other uses to ensure it positively addresses its context. The handling of the car parking is also intelligently resolved by accommodating it above and below the store. In principal we welcome the decision to front the riverside elevation with residential use, which will benefit from views to the south. We consider this elevation to be more successful than the Tesco frontage, although it appears potentially over-glazed. The massing of this frontage also reads too readily like a ‘wrap’ when its blank rear elevation is seen from the north. Revisiting the single aspect accommodation might offer a way to resolve this. Instead of deep and narrow apartments, the design team could consider wider, shallower units with longer balconies and some small openings to the north offering through ventilation and glimpses of the historic core. Alternatively, the design team could consider wrapping the Tesco store with the rooms of one of the hotels, allowing for the residential component to be developed as a stand-alone block.

We were uncomfortable with the use of nautical images as a driver for the architecture which, in our view, is not consistent with the scheme’s riverside setting. As illustrated in the Tesco frontage, such references seem ill-suited to this town centre context; the inclined rainscreen cladding appears arbitrary and the ‘porthole’ openings reduce the elevation to façadism. The heavy, undulating roofline also fails to echo the delicacy of the sails of Thames barges used for its inspiration. Further, as a rule, placing store logos on glazed frontages works more successfully than setting them on a solid background. We support the notion of a green wall to enclose the service yard but consider that a planted wall would be far preferable to the metal mesh currently proposed. We urge the applicant to rethink this in the final design.

Whilst we support the scale of the hotel buildings, we find the geometric and chequerboard elevations unfitting and particularly cheerless in this context. Trespa panelling can achieve a better quality if well articulated. However, the large expanses of unrepentant Trespa panels employed on these buildings will not, in our view, make for a high quality scheme and reflects a lack of generosity in the buildings. We suggest that an architectural language should be developed that is not just more specific to the place, but more celebratory of its riverfront context.

Sustainability

While we are encouraged by the use of CCHP to take advantage of the mix of uses proposed for the site, we think there is further scope to reduce the energy demand of the store. Given the increasing appetite from store operators to reduce the energy load of their stores, the design team could, for example, investigate incorporating rooflights into the rooftop car park to reduce the energy demand from lighting. This would also give a visual link to the activity taking place below. We would also ask the design team to think more carefully about the implications of glazing the southern frontage to the extent proposed. Further testing of the environmental performance and quality of living in the accommodation may suggest the need for a reduction in the amount of glazing.